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Showing posts from January, 2020

Double-dipping

Is double-dipping becoming more common? I have a few former bosses/colleagues that have retired from one national lab, with full pensions, and gone on to start new jobs at other national lab. They are all over 65. Used to be guys left at 60-62. Was wondering if this is becoming a trend, particularly with baby boomers who want to keep working.

DJ Johnson of Honeywell

DJ Johnson of Honeywell is a textbook example of an Organizational Conflict of Interest. He is micromanaging and directing work at Sandia in order to raise the Kansas City performance evaluations. He is attending internal meetings which are far below his level and are not supposed to include people outside of the Sandia and Kansas City org structures. Sandia and Kansas City are legally distinct entities under different contracts. An FFRDC is not allowed to provide benefit to other organizations which may be related to their managing company.

Ex-LANL scientist pleads guilty

https://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/local_news/ex-lanl-scientist-pleads-guilty-to-lying-to-government/article_85c1b06c-3ec6-11ea-b962-0bde11da0101.html ALBUQUERQUE — A former Los Alamos National Laboratory scientist accused of lying about his contact with a Chinese recruitment program pleaded guilty Friday to one count of making a false statement to the U.S. government. Turab Lookman of Santa Fe accepted the plea as part of an agreement with federal prosecutors that includes dismissal of two other charges. Lookman will be sentenced at a later date, probably within 60 to 90 days, federal prosecutor George C. Kraehe said. He could face up to five years in federal prison and be fined as much as $250,000. Lookman, who was 67 when he was arrested, admitted to lying to a LANL investigator in 2018 about his contact with a program that prosecutors said had been “established by the Chinese government to recruit people with access to and knowledge of foreign technology and intellectual proper...

UC/LLNL retirees settlement

UC/LLNL retirees have reached a settlement with the University of California to compensate the UC/LLNL retirees for health care benefit premium increases. What chance do LLNS employees have of acquiring similar retirement health care premium compensation from UC if they too were 100% vested UC/LLNL employees before the 2007 transition to LLNS?

Debate instead of denigrate!

Dear blog visitor, Please keep your comments on topic. Make them informative and interesting and not a way to win an argument. You will never win an argument in an anonymous fashion. Together,  let us improve our blog and make it a friendly place where educated people come to inform and debate, instead of regurgitate and denigrate. I feel obligated and committed to  filter out any useless, bitter attacks. Cordially, Scooby, Doobydew, Julian

Hilarious Glassdoor review of Sandia

Hilarious Glassdoor review on Sandia National Laboratories  https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Employee-Review-Sandia-National-Laboratories-RVW30450680.htm "Be Aware of Major Drawbacks" Former Employee - Senior Member of Technical Staff in Albuquerque, NM Doesn't Recommend Neutral Outlook No opinion of CEO I worked at Sandia National Laboratories full-time for more than 5 years Pros 9/80 schedule, health benefits, the freedom to move around to other projects or groups within the labs and job security. Cons Where to start? The politics, back-stabbing and dog-eat-dog competition is extreme to the point of being counterproductive, stressful and exhausting. Funding changes constantly, making it very difficult to develop and maintain core competency. Lot's of pressure to fit square pegs into round holes for the sake of capitalizing on a prior technology investment. The Good Old Boys network and nepotism are alive and well. The best way to get ahead is to go to the right c...

Apples and oranges

Glassdoor Rating of LLNL (LLNS) a Federally Funded Contractor Compared to True Private Sector Companies is a Stretch at Best. How can Glassdoor rate LLNL (LLNS) a federally funded contractor among other true private sector companies that don't have the luxury of DOE/NNSA bankrolling every dumb or unwarranted workforce or employee litigation related decision they make like the UC/LLNL retirees health care benefits being transferred to LLNS decision, Dee Kotla being fired, etc. At best, there should be a derating factor for federal contractors that can easily intimidate or do as they wish to employees and not face any materiel business or profit blowback. DOE/NNSA contractor employee survey candidness should be taken with a grain of salt compared with the real private sector that face material and prompt consequences for how they treat their workforce.